JONNY PHILLIPS: I'm afraid sir you have head lice. I'm not gonna be able to deal with you today.

RICHARD AMBROSE: You're joking.

JONNY PHILLIPS[to camera]: How embarrassing. But what do head lice really look like, up close under the microscope.

JONNY PHILLIPS[V/O]: And when I say close, I mean at 200 times magnification. It's reckoned that as many as 3 million people per year in the UK suffer louse infestation and contrary to popular belief, the little devils are not attracted to particularly clean or dirty hair. Anything will do.

JONNY PHILLIPS: I really don't like them. I don't mind bed mites you know, uh, dust mites living in your bed, but they live on you.

JONNY PHILLIPS[V/O]: There are about 400 different species of head lice and fully grown they can range from a teeny .3 of a millimetre to a mammoth 11 millimetres in length.

RICHARD AMBROSE: You know they feed on the blood from your scalp.

JONNY PHILLIPS: Yeah, it's disgusting. But apparently without it they don't live long, they won't survive. And they can't jump, hop, fly, swim, any of those things.

RICHARD AMBROSE: Mmmm.

JONNY PHILLIPS: So the only way to transfer from head to head is by direct contact.

RICHARD AMBROSE: That's why kids get 'em, innit?

JONNY PHILLIPS: Yeah.

RICHARD AMBROSE[off camera]: They use those claws to hang onto your hair.

JONNY PHILLIPS[V/O]: Lice are incredibly difficult to remove. They can shut down their breathing holes to avoid drowning in the shower and are becoming ever more tolerant to insecticide shampoos. Covering your head in caster oil or mayonnaise to remove lice are just urban myths. The best way to get rid of these little blood suckers is by two weeks of regular attacks with a fine tooth comb.